ONLINE EVENT | January 22nd, 2022, 2pm PST / 5pm EST
Ask Me Anything: TV Writers Tell All
ALL ENTRANTS
Register now to hear from working TV writers as they answer your pressing questions, the highs and lows, and how they came to be in their current positions.
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Get casual and comfy for our live online event January 22nd to hear from Emily Cheever, Paula Puryear, Emily Schmidt and Maria Escobedo for this conversation-style webinar where they answer your questions, discuss their careers, the current state of writers rooms and help take the mystery out of the process. Bring your questions!
This program is supported in part by an arts grant from the City of West Hollywood.
Emily Cheever
Writer
Legends of Tomorrow, CW
Emily Cheever was born to a family of adventurers and raised reading fantasy novels on a (probably haunted) Civil War battlefield in Northern Virginia.
She graduated from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts with a BFA in Screenwriting, an accidental minor in Sociology, and an honorary degree in eating everything bagels. She’s been a pie maker, a film critic, a cater waiter, a dog walker, and a bartender, but throughout it all she’s always been a writer of feminist adventure stories.
Her original pilot BEGINNER'S HISTORY awarded her a spot in the Screencraft Residency in Jamaica, co-sponsored by JAFTA.
She is currently a staff writer at DC'S LEGENDS OF TOMORROW and represented by Affirmative Entertainment.
Paula Puryear
Writer/Director
The Rookie (ABC)
Paula Puryear is a feature film and television writer. She currently
writes for ABC’s THE ROOKIE, and has also written features and
long-form television for Twentieth Century Fox, CBS, Showtime,
Lifetime and various production companies. She made her
directorial debut with the short film HELLO MY NAME IS RAJER,
and is currently planning her follow-up.
Paula was born in the American South to a political scientist and
civil rights activist father and an educator mother. She’s a
graduate of Duke University, where she co-founded the Duke
University Women’s Center, and Columbia University School of
Law, where she served on the Human Rights Law Review and
held a summer human rights internship in Kenya. Her
experiences that summer — with CIA operatives, gun runners and
a failed coup — led her to embrace the adventure of storytelling,
and leave the law behind.
Maria Escobedo
Writer
Grey's Anatomy (ABC)
East Los High (Hulu)
Maria is a native New Yorker, living in Los Angeles, who writes for both live action and animation. Her writing credits include Grey’s Anatomy, Hulu’s East Los High, plus Madagascar: A Little Wild for Dreamworks, Nickelodeon’s Santiago of the Seas, and Disney’s Elena of Avalor!
She's a 1st generation Latina raised in NYC's Washington
Heights, (yes, she was raised: In The Heights!) and she spent her summers with family in Miami and Puerto Rico. After film school, Maria co-wrote and directed, Rum and Coke, an indie film, and wrote a movie for Disney Channel, Lifetime (co-wrote), and developed a half hour single cam pilot for Nickelodeon.
She recently co-wrote and developed an hour-long dramedy pilot for ABC. Maria has also written and sold pilots in the animated
kids space, (Disney, Nick, Amazon, Netflix, Universal Kids, Dreamworks, PBS) earning a Humanitas nomination. She has a degree in film from NY’s School of Visual Arts, studied screenwriting at NYU, playwriting at The Puerto Rican Traveling Theater, and earned a TV Writing Fellowship from ABC/Disney. Maria served as Chair of the Latino Writers Committee at the WGAW for 5 years.
Emily Schmidt
Writer
Ghosts (ABC)
Welcome to Flatch (FOX)
Emily Schmidt is a TV writer originally from St. Louis Park, Minnesota. Essentially a very tall middle-aged woman since birth, Emily spent her childhood watching GOLDEN GIRLS and drinking Diet Pepsi with the moms and teachers. As a result, she enjoys writing grounded, honest, joke-filled and often queer comedy for women -- mostly over the age of 40.
Emily graduated from NYU Tisch and got her first job in a room working as a Writers' Assistant for Netflix's GIRLBOSS (where she also made her on-screen debut). From there, she assisted Kay Cannon as an on-set joke writer for the feature film, BLOCKERS. Emily was a staff writer for Netflix's NO GOOD NICK, a story editor for the upcoming FOX comedy, WELCOME TO FLATCH, and most recently an executive story editor for CBS' GHOSTS. She also sold a pitch to ABC Studios, and is currently taking out another pitch with a friend.
In her free time, Emily used to enjoy doing improv and eating at restaurants. Emily took that for granted. Now, Emily pours all of her attention into sitting in her apartment and cuddling with her pitbull, Stella. She is represented by Kaplan Stahler.
ERIN ENBERG
Host, Program Director - AIM
Writer/Director
Erin Enberg is a screenwriter/director from Maine (a spooky Stephen King town in the woods where "The Mist" takes place) and has worked in production on film and TV in New York City and Los Angeles for NBC, A&E, Travel Channel, TLC, HBO and more.
She also once traveled extensively throughout the U.S. in an old renovated city bus with nine other people for three months - while working on a Columbia University documentary about unique roadside attractions with cinematographer Chris Teague (Emmy-winner "Russian Doll"). Erin's short films have won various awards including several best shorts and audience awards, and her screenplays have garnered accolades including Second Rounder at Sundance, and finalist selections in the Final Draft Big Break Contest and Cinestory. Her most recent short, "The Getaway," is currently on the festival circuit.
Erin volunteered for PEN America from 2016 - 2019 as a fundraising coordinator and was invited to teach a screenwriting workshop for the University of California Merced for their Collaboratorium: Create & Connect event in 2021. She has an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Southern Maine's Stonecoast Program.
Most recently she worked at HBO in the Production Department and at HBO Max in Original Content, and currently works as Program Director for Age Inclusion in Media. This fall, Erin received a scholarship from Sundance to attend their nine-week Directing course.
IG @erin.enberg
Twitter @ErinEnberg
Age Inclusion in Media - Twitter @ageinclusion